EMEHSON] UNWRITTEN LITERATURE OF HAWAII 123 



He keiki akamai ko ia pali; 

 Elima uo piia i ka lima. 

 Kui oe a lawa 

 10 I lei no ku'u aloha ; 



Ma lama malie oe i ka makemake, 

 I lei hooheno no ke aloha ole. 



Moe oe a ala mai ; 

 Nana iho oe i kou pono. 

 15 Hai'na ia ka puana : 



Keiki noho pali o Hamakua ; 

 A waka-waka, a waka-waka. 



[Translation] 



Song 



It was in Hamakua ; 

 I sat in a grove of Pandanus, 

 A stranger at my arrival, 

 A rock was my shelter from rain. 

 5 I found it a wearisome wait, 

 Cautiously shifting about. 



There's a canny son of the cliff 

 That has five buds to his hand. 

 You shall twine me a wreath of due length, 

 10 A wreath to encircle my love, 



Whilst you hold desire in strong curb. 

 Till love-touch thaws the cold-hearted. 



When you rise from sleep on the mat, 

 Look down, see the conquest of love. 

 15 The meaning of this short story? 



What child fondly clings to the cliff? 

 Waka-waka, the shell-fish. 



The scene of this idyl, this love-song, 7nele hoipoipo, is Hamakua, 

 a district on the windward side of Hawaii, subject to rain-squalls. 

 The poet in his allegory represents himself as a stranger sitting in a 

 pandanus grove, ulu hala (verse 2) ; sheltering himself from a rain- 

 squall by crouching behind a rock, ua fe'epe'e pohahu (verse 4) ; 

 shifting about on account of the veering of the wind, luli-luli malie 

 iho (verse 6). Interpreting this figuratively, Hamakua, no doubt, 

 is the woman in the case; the grove an emblem of her personality 

 and physical charms; the rain-squall, of her changeful moods and 

 passions. The shifting about of the traveler to meet the veering of 

 the wind would seem to mean the man's diplomatic efforts to deal 

 with the woman's varying caprices and outbursts. 



He now takes up a parable about some creature, a child of the cliff — 

 Hamakua's ocean boundary is mostly a precipitous wall — which he 

 represents as a hand with five buds. Addressing it as a servant, 

 he bids this creature twine a wreath sufficient for his love, kui oe a 



